


Would You Like A Drink With That?

by bitsori



Category: Stray Kids (Band)
Genre: Acquaintances to Friends to Lovers, Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Non-Famous, Alternate Universe - Roommates/Housemates, Angst with a Happy Ending, Bartenders, IDK LMAO Various Tropes are Used and Not at the same time tbh, M/M, Moving On
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-11-01
Updated: 2018-11-01
Packaged: 2019-08-11 09:37:21
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 13,677
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16473077
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bitsori/pseuds/bitsori
Summary: “Soju shots, please,” Hyunjin requests, taking his jacket off before hoisting himself up on a stool by the bar.“Again, huh?” The bartender comments when he looks up and finds Hyunjin there. The corners of his lips turn up prettily, showing an amused smile, and the way his eyes take in and study Hyunjin’s appearance makes the latter feel self conscious. “It’s been a while this time - I was starting to think I’d never see you again.”--or: In which Hyunjin has his heart broken one too many times, and Minho's always been there to serve him a drink or two whenever it happens; AU





	Would You Like A Drink With That?

**Author's Note:**

> [ 1 ] I… don’t know where this came from. I just knew I wanted to write Minho/Hyunjin because they’d be beautiful together, and this somehow happened? I don’t even remember where I got the idea from. Maybe from a dream, LMAO.
> 
> [ 2 ] I don’t think there’s anything particularly triggering in this, but there’s a kind of overall angsty/somber tone to most of this. But if you’ve read anything I wrote before, you’d know that I always end my stuff in a happy or hopeful note. If you haven’t read anything I wrote before, well.. now you know. HAH. This piece isn’t any different, so please do try to get to the end!
> 
> [ 3 ] They're obviously aged-up for the purpose of the setting, so characterization is also slightly tweaked to fit their older age.
> 
> [ 4 ] As usual, advanced apologies for any spelling mistakes and grammatical errors I might have missed.

  
  


❦

  
  
  


“Soju shots, please,” Hyunjin requests, taking his jacket off before hoisting himself up on a stool by the bar.

“Again, huh?” The bartender comments when he looks up and finds Hyunjin there. The corners of his lips turn up prettily, showing an amused smile, and the way his eyes take in and study Hyunjin’s appearance makes the latter feel self conscious. “It’s been a while this time - I was starting to think I’d never see you again.”

Hyunjin shrugs, and he doesn’t have to say much more before the bartender - Lee Minho, that’s his name, and by now Hyunjin knows it all too well - is setting a drink down in front of him. It’s not a soju shot like he’d asked, but rather a creamy looking yellow drink that smelled quite sweet when Hyunjin lifts it off the surface of the bar. It’s a bit frothy at the top, with small chocolate shavings sprinkled on it.

“What’s the base?” Hyunjin asks, after giving it one more sniff. He’d like to say he can identify it, but he isn’t any sort of alcohol expert.

“Bourbon,” Minho answers. “Drink it up and forget your problems for tonight.”

  
  


It’s a bit of a routine by now - Hyunjin dates, Hyunjin gets his heart broken, Hyunjin goes to the local bar and gets his wounds tended to by Minho, with deceptively sweet drinks laced with more than enough alcohol to distract Hyunjin from his aching heart.

He _always_ asks for soju shots, but the first drink Minho serves hims with is always something else. Sometimes, when Hyunjin’s heart is close to being mended, he’d wonder if there’s any meaning to this, but soon enough he’d get distracted—

Another guy, another cliff to freefall off of, and the cycle just starts all over again.

  
  
  


The first time Hyunjin walked into Eugene's, he was barely an adult. Granted, he was certainly legal, and he had proudly provided his ID when Minho had asked for it before serving him. Eugene's was different from what Hyunjin thought it would be - pop culture only ever introduced high class bars and dance clubs to him, but Eugene's was more a hole-in-the-wall dive bar than anything else. Maybe this should have turned him off - the lighting was always dim giving it a seedy appearance, and the place was suspiciously never packed, but then again, this is exactly why he chose it. The lack of customers meant it wasn’t as crowded or as noisy as the other drinking establishments that lined the streets of Itaewon, and whenever he passed by, and the dim lighting felt to him more cozy, than creepy.

“What’s his name?” Minho had asked him the moment he sat down by the bar, and Hyunjin had looked up, startled.

“Whose name?” He asked, unable to chase away the rising panic he felt in his chest. Minho had chuckled, clearly amused, which did nothing but make Hyunjin feel even more uneasy than he already did.

“Don’t worry,” Minho assured him, his voice smooth even as he moves around from behind the counter, already preparing a drink even though all Hyunjin had asked for was bottle of soju and a shot glass. “I know your type, is all,” he explained, placing down a tall cocktail glass in front of him, filled with transparent green liquid and garnished with a small mint leaf. “Try this,” Minho said, all matter-of-fact. “I just learned to make it today.”

“What is it?” Hyunjin asked, cautious even as he took a sip. It tasted a bit tart, and he felt a lingering fizz on his tongue even after the liquid smoothly slid down his throat. “Is this what they call an appletini?”

Minho half scoffed, and half laughed. “No, it’s even better than that - plus that uses gin, not vodka. Do you like it?”

Hyunjin shrugged, trying his best to appear nonchalant, but he kept sipping on the drink anyway.

“Careful there,” Minho warned him, laughing as he watched Hyunjin practically down the rest of the cocktail in one go. “That’s stronger than it looks.”

Hyunjin didn’t listen; instead he asked for another, and then another after that, and soon enough—

“His name is Jeongin,” he slurred. “Yang Jeongin!” There was a twinkle in his eye, and an easy smile ghosting on his lips - hard not to, because Yang Jeongin was the type of boy who brought smiles to people’s faces, apparently even after he’s broken their hearts.

“Jeongin? Cute name,” Minho commented. “Tell me more.”

And so Hyunjin did. He talked about Yang Jeongin, his boyfriend who was younger by a year - his boyfriend that he’d confessed to, halfway through his last year of high school and he talked about how maybe that wasn’t the best idea because while a one year gap doesn’t seem like a lot when you’re both in high school, it definitely begins to start feeling like a lot more once one of you moves on ahead to university.

“He’s the cutest, hyung,” Hyunjin went on, flushed in the face, and practically gushing. “He’s always smiling, so sometimes it’s a little hard to tell what he’s thinking, but that didn’t matter too much because he _always_ spoke his mind anyway.” He paused, and while Minho quirked an eyebrow in interest, he he kept silent, opting instead to let Hyunjin continue rambling on. “Maybe that was our problem in the end, you know, hyung? He was too blunt in the end. He told me it wasn’t working out because we were busy with different things - and he said it with that same… that same—!” He let out a frustrated huff, and suddenly the light in his eyes dimmed. “He dumped me, still with that stupid smile on his face,” He continued grimly. “I wonder, hyung, if I did things differently - if I didn’t get too carried away with other things, maybe we wouldn’t have drifted apart and maybe we’d still be together.”

“That’s dumb,” Minho said, finally speaking up foe first the first time after Hyunjin’s long, self-pitying monologue. “So many ifs and maybes, but not one of them is the absolute truth because none of them took place. Relationships take two people, so it almost never happens that it’s just the one person’s fault. And you’re young - I can guarantee greater loves down the line. Besides, if you were still together, then you wouldn’t be here, drinking your heart out and talking to me, and talking to me is a great thing, you know.”

Hyunjin inhaled deeply and he looked up, his sad eyes meeting Minho’s shiny, teasing ones. “Whatever, he was a shit kisser anyway - his braces were always clanging against my teeth, it was annoying.” He didn’t mean it, not really, but the way Minho laughed at his comment was at least enough to make Hyunjin crack a small, but genuine smile.

  
  
  


Hyunjin isn’t sure when he passes out. He only remembers being served one vodka shot after another, and then the next thing he knows is that he’s being shaken awake.

“Hyunjin—” Minho has his hand on his shoulder, and when Hyunjin’s eyes slowly start to open, it’s the bartender’s blurry features that greets him first. “Hyunjinnie, we’re closing—” He sighs. “Actually, we’re closed now, so you need to go.”

Hyunjin whines when he tries to straighten up in his seat; he immediately feels blood rushing to his head, and he has to hold onto the edge of the bartop when he tries to stand on his feet.

“Are you okay?” Minho is by his side immediately, frowning with concern as he tries to help steady Hyunjin. If he was more sober, perhaps Hyunjin would be able to appreciate this side of Minho more. He’s been coming to this bar for years, and even though it’s easy to sense genuine care in the drinks that Minho has prepared for him throughout that time, Minho also seemed to be permanently sporting an amused smirk that gave off a detached vibe.

Hyunjin wonders if the attitude clocks off together with his bartending shift, and when Minho hands him a glass of water, Hyunjin decides that this certainly is the case.

“Are you okay?” Minho asks again after Hyunjin downs the entire glass of water. The place is empty now, and all the chairs are stacked upside down on the tables - Hyunjin realises that Minho had already finished cleaning up before he’d even woken him up.

“Yeah— Yes,” he nods, attempting a small smile even though he actually feels quite sick. There’s like a brewing storm in his stomach, and Hyunjin has to keep swallowing his own spit as he tries to hold everything else back.

“You don’t really look it,” Minho murmurs observantly. “How are you getting home, by the way? Is there a friend I can call for you?”

Hyunjin purses his lips and ducks his head - only every other word coming out of Minho’s mouth is registering in his head. “Sorry, hyung, what was that?” He asks, even though he’s still too preoccupied with trying not to feel sick. “I’ll be fine, don’t worry,” he adds in monotone, mostly because the worry reflected in Minho’s eyes doesn’t go unnoticed by him.

“I don’t know, Hyunjin,” Minho sighs. “What about that one friend of yours? The one who used to always pick you up before? Tall guy, puppy eyes - the one who always looked like his khakis were freshly pressed even though it’s the middle of the night? I thought he’d come like he usually did.”

Hyunjin winces at the mention of the so-called friend. “He isn’t coming,” he says icily, and even in his wasted state he notices the way realisation dawns on Minho’s face as he connects that familiar friend with the name Seungmin, the latest in the list of men who have broken Hyunjin’s heart.

They barely make it out to the sidewalk before Hyunjin is heaving into the gutter, throwing up a disgusting combination of that night’s drinks and light dinner.

“There, there,” Minho sighs, leaning down over him as he gently strokes Hyunjin’s back. He feels like complete shit, but he has to admit that Minho’s touch is somewhat soothing.

“I’m so—” He’s about to say, but more bile coming from his throat beats his words to the exit. This isn’t the first time that Hyunjin has gotten drunk and wasted, and Minho himself has been witness to most of those times before; still, Hyunjin is pretty sure this is the worst he’s ever felt.

He hears the light sound of a zipper opening, and when he turns his head, he finds Minho pulling out a half empty bottle of water from his bag which he offers immediately to Hyunjin. “Drink this,” Minho instructs him, the worry in his tone mostly masked with rational logic when he continues. “We can’t let you get dehydrated.”

He takes the drink without question, and he proceeds to gulp the contents down. It makes him wince at first - his mouth tastes like shit, but he supposes that’s his own doing.

“You don’t have anywhere to go tonight, do you?” It’s a question, but the way Minho says it doesn’t really make it sound like one, and Hyunjin is now too tired to insist otherwise, because Minho is right. The last place he wants to go to is home - nay, scratch that, it isn't _home._ It’s just the apartment he’s shared with Seungmin for the last six months, and he’s pretty sure he’d rather spend his time vomiting all over the streets of Seoul than go back there, at least for the night. “Okay, then,” Minho sighs, nodding even though Hyunjin hasn’t exactly verbalised a response. “I guess I’m taking you home tonight.”

  
  
  


Hyunjin wakes up with a massive hangover. His head is throbbing - it feels like there’s a massive hammer pounding loud and hard against his brain that he almost wants to just pull the covers over his head and cry. But he also wakes up to the smell of delicious, freshly cooked rice, and that’s what has him forcing himself up to his feet so he can investigate.

“Hey—” Minho greets him with a smile as soon as he peers into the kitchen. “You hungry? Food’s almost ready, so if you want to clean up—” He points to one of two doors behind Hyunjin, “—that’s the bathroom. In case you don’t remember from last night.”

Hyunjin nods mutely before turning on his heel and heading into the bathroom. He only has a vague recollection of how the rest the previous evening played out, especially after they’d arrived at Minho’s apartment. He’s not wearing his clothes from the day before - instead, he has on a loose white shirt, and gray joggers that were a bit too short - so he assumes that despite having no memory of it, he’d managed to at least change into these borrowed clothes before he passed out on Minho’s couch.

He stares at his reflection in the bathroom mirror - his eyes are bloodshot, and there are faint imprints of vertical lines on his cheek, which he assumes are from the pattern of Minho’s couch coverlet.

“Hey—” Hyunjin almost feels like his soul leaves his body in surprise when Minho’s head suddenly peers in through the door. He clutches at his chest as he calms himself down, but Minho just laughs, obviously entertained by his reaction. “I just wanted to tell you it’s okay to use my products if you want to wash up. You’re a pretty boy, but—” He chuckles and gestures at his own face. “You kinda look like you need it right now.”

The comment somehow makes a slight blush creep onto Hyunjin’s cheeks, but he nods wordlessly, and after Minho closes the door after him, he remembers to turn the lock this time around. He doesn’t take too long in the bathroom; at least he takes shorter than he usually would if he was at home and feeling more comfortable but he does take long enough to feel more awake and fresh.

The breakfast spread that greets him after he steps back out is something that Hyunjin hasn’t seen for a while, not since he moved out of his parent’s house a year and a half into his university schooling. It’s not even much, just a few side dishes to go with the bowls of rice that Minho had already scooped for both of them, but it’s a lot for someone like Hyunjin who’s mostly just gotten by with either takeout leftovers or a piece of bread for breakfast over the last couple of years.

“Did you make all of these?” He asks, slightly in awe, as he takes a seat at the small table.

“The stir fried mushrooms and the egg rolls, I did,” Minho explains, a hint of pride detectable in his tone. A brief thought of how Seungmin likes eggs - _loves egg rolls_ \- passes through Hyunjin’s train of thought, but he’s quick to suppress it in favor of listening to Minho talk. “I bought the pickled radishes from the supermarket though, and my mom gave me the kimchi the last time I visited home.”

“Do you always eat this much?” He inquires, suddenly wondering if Minho did all this because or for him. He feels guilty enough for taking advantage of the older’s generosity and kindness by spending the night.

“Don’t worry, I didn’t do it for you or anything,” Minho answers bluntly, as if he’d just read Hyunjin’s thoughts. “I work late nights, and I never wake up early, so I always do a lot for my first meal of the day. Just made a little bit more than usual because I have a guest.”

His answer does make Hyunjin feel better, even if only by a little. He still feels bad for imposing, but Minho doesn’t seem bothered, so he follows suit by picking up his metal chopsticks and digging into his food.

“You feeling any better now?” They mostly eat in silence, at least until halfway through the meal when Minho decides to ask this. “It’s been a while since I’ve seen you this fucked up.”

Hyunjin winces, and forces another bite of egg roll into his mouth so he can avoid answering. It doesn’t seem to matter to Minho anyway, who gives him a suspicious glance but continues to talk.

“The last time that comes close was what— almost two years ago?” He hums, reaching for mushrooms to place into his bow. “What was the name of that guy again?”

Hyunjin shrugs, like it’s no big deal, like it’s too long ago now to recall who or what Minho is referring to, but—

But of course, he remembers.

  
  


Hyunjin’s time with Changbin was brief, but mostly filled with laughter.

They’d first met at a laundromat, of all places. It was Hyunjin’s first time at one, and his mother _had_ told him he could come home any time if he needed his clothes washed and laundered, but he wanted to prove a point. He’d insisted on moving out and living by himself, and he was going to show them he was capable of making it on his own.

The problem was that he hadn’t done his laundry for almost a month and he was running out of clean underwear. It shouldn’t even be a problem, because there’s a laundromat right across the street from the building he was living in, but he’d been so concerned about not knowing what to do that he kept putting the chore off.

He was squinting at the instructions plastered right next to the machine, but half the words were already faded, and so the sign was therefore quite useless.

“You want some help there?” Someone offered with a grunt, and when he turned to look, he found a disaffected looking young man. He was smaller than Hyunjin, but somehow he also had a more intimidating vibe about him that made Hyunjin metaphorically shrink a bit.

“Uh,” He considered turning down the offer, but after looking down at the massive bag of dirty clothes he was carrying, he decided he was way too desperate and couldn’t afford putting off clean clothes another day. “Yes, please?”

The guy had laughed, low, kind of guttural, but also loud and free. Hyunjin was fascinated, and his own laughter was easily drawn out for it.

“It’s simple, really,” the guy said. “You just throw your clothes in,” he explained, gesturing at Hyunjin’s load. “And then you dump the detergent in, fill it with water, and then you let ‘er rip.”

Hyunjin cautiously followed the stranger’s instructions. “I’m not supposed to separates whites and colors?” He asked, even as he dumped all of his clothes into the machine at once. “There’s no difference if I use cold or hot water?”

The guy just shrugged at any and all questions he brought up. “This is how I do it,” he proclaimed. “So it should be fine.”

“Um—” Hyunjin had no choice but to follow suit, even though he still couldn’t believe that it ended up being as simple as it did.

“I’m Changbin, by the way,” the guy introduced himself, finally, a lopsided grin decorating his features. It made him look quite sure of himself, but also more approachable than Hyunjin originally pegged him to be.

“Hyunjin,” he returned, a relieved and grateful smile decorating his lips. “My name is Hwang Hyunjin.”

And during the next half hour, he’d learned a lot about Seo Changbin - like how he worked at a tattoo parlour somewhere in Hongdae, and even though his boss barely let him do anything past the initial stenciling, he’d like to think that he’s working his way up to bigger responsibilities. And then he had rolled his sleeves up to show off the exquisite art drawn on his arms - “My own designs,” he boasted proudly - and Hyunjin could think of nothing outside of how much he wanted to reach out and trace the the lines and colors with his fingers.

“I have a few others elsewhere on my body,” Changbin explained. “Maybe one day I’ll let you see the rest,” he added, and Hyunjin could only laugh, flustered upon the realisation that this man was smoothly flirting with him.

The way Hyunjin’s white shirts had turned out varying shades of pink and purple after that was quite unfortunate, and Changbin had flashed him an embarrassed but sheepish smile at the reveal that he wasn’t actually as knowledgeable in The Art of Laundry as he’d made himself seem, but somehow it didn’t seem to matter as much when he had Changbin’s KakaoTalk safely added to his contacts.

In hindsight, a lot of that first meeting is quite indicative of how the rest of their relationship played out - Changbin leading Hyunjing through a number of firsts in a bumbling manner, resulting in things halfway falling apart and yet somehow at the end of the day Hyunjin never minded so much because it’s Changbin and he makes Hyunjin laugh and smile and _feel good,_ and it kept being okay, kept happening like that, until one day it just wasn’t alright anymore and it was over.

Still, three months after that day at the laundromat, when Hyunjin sat at Minho’s bar mulling about yet another failed relationship, the thing about Changbin that he talked about the most was his jokes and his easy nature, and the way there was never a quiet or dull moment with him.

“He sounds like he’s a great guy,” Minho said as he served Hyunjin with a highball glass, filled almost to the brim with dark liquid. “Sorry it didn’t work out.”

“Me too,” Hyunjin agreed, and when the drink travels down his throat, it tastes dark and smoky, but with a strangely sweet aftertaste. It reminded him of Changbin, somehow, which is what prompted him to ask for another, and another, _and another,_ until the rest of the night is mostly just a blurry recollection drowned out by alcohol.

  
  
  


It’s nearing late afternoon, and Hyunjin had done nothing but laze around in Minho’s apartment all day. To be fair, he had offered his help as Minho cleaned around the house but the older had dismissed his services, telling him to just sit still and relax, so instead, he’d ended up on the couch all day, watching television and piggybacking on Minho’s Netflix account.

When Minho tiredly plops down next to him on the couch, he does nothing for the next minute but stare at Hyunjin, making him feel uneasy. Hyunjin figures that Minho is probably wondering why Hyunjin is _still_ in his house without having said a single word about going on his way.

“So, you have anywhere you can go back to?”

And of course, there it is. Hyunjin feels flushed, and he fidgets with the remote control in his hand, before finally just turning the television off with it. How is he supposed to explain that it’s more about not having anywhere else he _wants_ to be?

“Hmm,” Minho keeps looking at him, his eyes practically boring a hole through the side of Hyunjin’s head. “It’s really that bad, huh? I guess you can stay here for a few days while you sort yourself out.” He pauses, and Hyunjin finally turns his head to look at the older, only to be taken aback at how close Minho’s face is to his.

He feels his heart skip a beat because this man is _so pretty,_ even up close like this. And then Minho breaks out into an even prettier smile, and Hyunjin has to turn away because he feels a blush coming up his cheeks.

 _Geez, Hyunjin,_ he thinks to himself. _Stop crushing on everyone who shows you even the barest amount of kindness._

“You know, you’re lucky,” Minho begins, leaning back, looking amused at what Hyunjin can only assume is his own embarrassment. “It’s my night off, so— you want to go and get some of your things? There’s no way I’m lending you underwear, and I figure it might be easier for you to go back to your place if someone comes with you?”

He doesn’t understand why Minho is being _this_ nice to him, and it makes him feel apprehensive. But he also knows that Minho is right, having company will be better in case his ex-boyfriend is at home, and he can’t keep borrowing clothes from Minho when the two of them are hardly the same size. It’s already big enough of the bartender to let Hyunjin stay over when the only way they even know each other is because of the countless times Minho has helped him nurse his broken heart with drinks over the last three or so years.

  
  
  


“Well, I should have figured that you live in the fancy part of the city,” Minho murmurs once they arrive at the building where Hyunjin’s apartment is located. A light blush spreads across Hyunjin’s cheeks - he’s embarrassed because as much as he takes pride in living on his own, the reality of it is that his parents still pay a huge chunk of his rent, and they’d played a big part in choosing the place.

“I guess it’s alright,” he answers, almost under his breath, like he isn’t sure he wants Minho to hear. It’s not as if the older sounds like he’s judging Hyunjin, in fact he just - as usual - seems amused, and maybe just a tad bit in awe. That makes Hyunjin feel all the more embarrassed about being so privileged though, so he’s thankful when Minho doesn’t say much else that refers to the social status implications of the area, or the building.

When he opens the door to his actual apartment, it’s dark inside - it means Seungmin isn’t at home. He isn’t sure if he’s disappointed or relieved, even though it makes sense that his ex-boyfriend has probably escaped back home to his parents. The apartment lease is under Hyunjin’s name anyway.

“I’ll be quick,” he tells Minho after he switches the lights on. “If you want, you can, uh— look around?” He casts a quick glance at Minho who is already walking around observantly, so he takes that as his cue to duck into the bedroom he once shared with Seungmin.

He notices that Seungmin’s side of the closet is mostly intact, but he doesn’t dwell on it. Instead, he pulls out a large duffel bag and stashes in it as many clothes as he can fit in it. He doesn’t even bother being picky with outfits - the faster he’s out of the apartment, the better.

“Are you sure you don’t want to stay here?” Minho’s voice cuts through his thoughts, surprising Hyunjin completely. When Hyunjin gets up, bag hoisted across his back, their eyes meet, and Minho continues to lightly prod. “I mean, your ex isn’t around - maybe you should assert yourself and tell him he’s the one who has to leave.” He chuckles, as if trying to make light of the situation. Hyunjin doesn’t hold it against him; he understands that all Minho knows about the situation is based on little tidbits that Hyunjin himself had told him while half drunk.

“No,” he answers simply. “I need to get out of here.” The thing is, more than Seungmin’s physical presence, he wants to escape this apartment and everything it represents. It’s too tainted now, with too many memories that he’d rather not remember at the moment.

“Okay,” Minho smiles and gestures at the extra bag that Hyunjin packed, offering a helping hand. Hyunjin smiles back, grateful that even though he and Minho barely know each other, the older has done nothing but be helpful, and all without pushing him, or pressing for too much information. “Let’s go.”

  
  


Hyunjin isn’t sure if days go faster or slower over the course of the following week. He does nothing but laze around Minho’s house, and he’s well aware that he’s become a big burden, one that his bartender acquaintance certainly hadn’t signed up for when he brought Hyunjin home. Any day now, Hyunjin assumes he’s going to be kicked out, but he figures he’ll deal with that when it happens.

To be fair, there was one morning when he tried making breakfast while Minho was locked up in his room, dead asleep - it wasn’t exactly successful, and Hyunjin is probably lucky that he didn’t trip off the smoke alarm. At least he got delivery to arrive before Minho woke up, but he still got warned by a tired Minho before he left for work, not to bother too much in the kitchen especially when he was out.

But even all of that is probably still quite low on the List of Things Hyunjin Should Probably Deal With ASAP, because he’s been consistently skipping school and he’s pretty sure that he’s going to end up flunking most, if not all, of his major course classes this term. He never mentions any of these things, opting to push them way, way back to the dark corners of his thoughts - it’s not easy, because Hyunjin is the type to overthink and repeatedly ruminate on each and every one of his life choices, but as the days go by and he gets more engrossed in the 800 episode anime Minho has on Netflix library, he finds that it becomes easier to ignore most of his demons - at least for now.

He’s sprawled out on MInho’s couch one afternoon, halfway through a melancholic animated movie for the second time (it hit him right in the gut with all the relatable feelings, so he’s torturing himself by watching it again), when Minho comes out of his room, and without a word or any kind of warning, throws himself on top of Hyunjin.

“Hyung—!” Needless to say, he’s surprised, but he isn’t able to do much as he lets the weight of the older pin him down on the settee.

“Hyunjin-ah,” Minho says his name with a chuckle, because surprisingly, despite Hyunjin’s overstaying, freeloading ways, Minho is in quite a pleasant mood that day.

“What is it hyung?” Hyung asks, laughter trickling out of his own throat, because Minho’s teetering is contagious in its own way.

“I’m bored,” he declares, and it’s almost like he’s trying to push his weight down deliberately to torture Hyunjin who is doing his best to wriggle out from under him. The fruitlessness of Hyunjin’s attempt just seems to further amuse Minho, who breaks out into even louder laughter before he finally slides off Hyunjin to sit on the floor instead. “I’m bored,” he repeats.

Hyunjin is unsure how to react to that, so with nervous laughter, he sits up and offers him the television remote control, but Minho shakes his head and pushes it away. Hyunjin gawks at him cluelessly.

“Hey, Hyunjin,” Minho starts again, and this time his tone is more wistful than teasing, which makes Hyunjin feel like he should pay better attention to what Minho is about to say. “I still remember when you first came to the bar, you know. You were so green!”

Hyunjin snorts, and then he breaks out into full blown laughter - of course he remembers, especially when he was just looking back to that particular time just recently. It’s funny how that time - and his breakup with Jeongin - feels like such a distant past now, when he’s pretty sure that his world had felt pretty shattered at the time. It’s why he’d even braved going into Eugene’s, despite only having drunk alcohol only once in his life before that.

“I don’t think I ever told you—” There’s a sly grin on Minho’s pretty lips when he looks over his shoulder to face Hyunjin. “I was pretty green that time, too. That was actually my first week at work - I bet you couldn’t even tell, could you?”

Hyunjin gives him a genuinely surprised look - he wishes he could say that he totally caught on that, but he didn’t. He wonders if that says more about Minho’s easy confidence, or his own brand of gullible. “You made me a fancy drink from the get go, hyung!”

Minho laughs and moves his fingers through his own hair, ruffling in it a way that slightly distracts Hyunjin - his locks looks so soft, and smooth, and Hyunjin kind of wants to reach out with his own hand to touch it.

“I’m pretty sure I told you I just learned how to make that,” Minho recalls, still laughing. “You just entered university then, right? And now you’re graduating soon? Time sure flies.”

Hyunjin winces at the mention of graduation, but when Minho glances at him, he readily offers a silent smile that he hopes doesn’t betray him.

“Hey, Hyunjin, I know I’m not serving you drinks right now, so this talk is less bartender and customer, but more, well—” Minho pauses, and looks down as he fiddles with the sleeve of his sweater. It’s almost like he’s a bit uncomfortable, or maybe even embarrassed of what he’s about to say, “—advice between friends, I guess.”

Hyunjin gives him a surprised look, but he doesn’t say anything, and he just nods to show that he’s listening.

“Sure you’re going through a tough time right now, but just remember not to throw away everything else you have going on in your life.”

Hyunjin winces again, and turns to look away - Minho’s right, but he’s been trying so hard to not think about it how much of his life he’s wasting away every day, that when the older puts it that way, it’s like he gets sudden whiplash.

“It’s more complicated than that,” he tries to assert, but the words just come out a mumbling mess. “And— no offense, hyung, but what do you know about complications like this anyway?” Even as the words slide off his tongue, Hyunjin already begins to regret them. He realises that he knows nothing about Minho, or his love life - he doesn’t even know if Minho is into guys or girls. “Sorry, hyung,” he mumbles immediately after, ducking his head in shame. “I mean—”

Whatever excuses he was going to give are cut off by Minho with a wave of a hand. “You’re right,” Minho nods, his expression more neutral now. It makes Hyunjin feel like crap, because just minutes earlier he had been so happy about being referred to as an actual ‘friend’ by Minho, and he ruined it by being a selfish, emotional trainwreck.

“Hyung, I’m sorry—” He tries again, but Minho just shakes his head.

“No need to apologise, like I said, you’re probably right about me, and what I know.” And then he smiles, the corners of his eyes wrinkling enough so that Hyunjin knows it’s genuine, despite the hint of sadness still reflected in his expression. “Anyway, all that aside, you wanna go with me to work? You can’t just mope around here all day and night, after all.”

Hyunjin is so eager to please and make things right again that he doesn’t even think before quickly nodding eagerly.

  
  
  


When Minho takes him to the bar, he assumes he’s there to be a paying customer like he usually is. But the ‘CLOSED’ sign is still hanging on the door, and before Minho disappears into the back entrance, he tells Hyunjin to wait for him by the sidewalk until he calls him to follow.

Unsure what to do, he leans against the wall of the building and tries to be patient. Not even five minutes have passed when a tall stranger approaches him.

“Excuse me, Sir?” The stranger asks; Hyunjin is too kind to ignore him, so he gives the man a small nod of acknowledgment. It helps that the man has a pleasant smile on his face, and he doesn’t really look suspicious at all, so Hyunjin lets him talk a bit more. “You look like you’re a little lost out here,” the guy continues. “You seem to be having a hard time?”

Hyunjin is taken aback, and he’s unsure how to proceed. Is he that transparent, even to random people on the street? “W-what?” Hyunjin stammers, confused but strangely drawn to the man. How could he possibly know about the hard times that Hyunjin’s fallen into?

“You just look like you need a bit of help - like you could use people to lean on to,” The man continues, and maybe Hyunjin should be more weirded out, but his voice sounds just as kind and pleasant as the look on his face. “Are you interested in—”

Whatever offering he was about to propose, however, is abruptly cut short by the sound of Minho’s voice ringing out down the street.

“Oi! Hyunjin!” Minho’s come out of the back door, but even though he’s calling his name, he isn’t looking at Hyunjin. Instead, he’s fixed a sharp glare at the stranger who funnily seems to shrink in his metaphorical boots. “Come with me now,” he adds, finally shifting his gaze to Hyunjin as he beckons with his hand.

“Okay, hyung,” he answers, before hurriedly exchanging farewell bows with the stranger, and finally shuffling inside the building after Minho himself.

“You should thank me,” Minho tells him once the door is closed after them “I told you to stay still, and instead you almost get recruited into a cult.” He pauses, and then as if he’s easily put the incident behind them now, he laughs.

Hyunjin, however, isn’t moving on quite as fast. “Wait, what? Cult?!”

His reaction has Minho laughing even more. “Yes, I’m pretty sure some religious nut was trying to recruit you into their circle— let me guess, they asked how you’re doing i your life and if you’re having a hard and—” Hyunjin’s eyes grow bigger, and wider, and finally Minho just stops talking, because he’s too far gone, laughing.

“You’re lucky I’m here,” he says, his voice almost cracking as he slings an arm protectively around Hyunjin’s shoulders. “Come on,” he adds, using his free hand to playfully tickle Hyunjin’s chin. “Let’s celebrate you escaping the the seedy clutches of a cult leader by having you meet my boss.”

  
  
  


Minho’s boss is named Woojin; at first Hyunjin thinks he says _Eugene_ , like the name of the place, and then he hears it again as _Woojin,_ before it finally dawns on him that the names are kind of similar so that probably means that Woojin is Eugene and Eugene is Woojin.

He’s a simple looking guy, kind of stocky with a square face, but a nice smile - although that doesn’t automatically make Hyunjin feel at ease, considering how pleasant the apparent cult recruiter had seemed just earlier, out in the sidewalk. But Woojin also has a certain warmth that he exudes even though he sounds all business-like once he opens his mouth.

“Ah, it’s nice to meet you Hyunjin-ssi,” he says. “Although I’ve seen you around a few times before, as a patron, no?”

“O-oh, yes!” Hyunjin breaks out into a friendly smile, quickly nodding because he feels a strange need to please Woojin.

Minho snorts at the two of them, but it doesn’t take long before he’s clapping on Hyunjin’s shoulder while addressing Woojin directly. “So this is him. You can promote Felix to front waiter, and Hyunjin will take over bussing and doing the dishes.”

Hyunjin’s eyes grow wide - this time with confusion _and_ panic, because _what?!_ He turns to Minho for an explanation, but Minho just goes on, simply ignoring the look that Hyunjin is giving him.

“It’s been awhile since we’ve been needing a replacement for Jisung anyway,” his voice strangely even. Hyunjin thinks he notices Woojin lift an eyebrow at that, but the subtle change in the older man’s expression is gone just as quickly, and Hyunjin starts to think that maybe he just imagined it.

“Do you have experience doing this?” Woojin asks, turning to face Hyunjin.

“Huh? Washing… dishes?” He asks, and both Woojin and Minho laugh simultaneously.

“Boss,” Minho clicks his tongue, and answers for him. “Does he look like he’s worked a service job for even a day in his life?”

Hyunjin ducks his head in embarrassment; he didn’t exactly ask to be hired for this job, but he feels a strange need to please both Minho _and_ Woojin.

“Come on, give him a chance,” Minho urges a skeptical looking Woojin. “Felix needs the help, so does Chaeyoung, on the floor.”

“Fine,” Woojin finally agrees before shoving a stained black apron into Hyunjin’s hands. “You can at least wash dishes without breaking anything right?”

Hyunjin nods quickly in agreement, but he hasn’t even spent an hour washing dishes before he breaks his first plate. “Fuck—” He hisses, panicked as he looks around to see who noticed him.

The only witness to his so-called crime is the boy called Felix, who is bringing in another stack of dirty plates for him to clean up. Their eyes meet, and Hyunjin’s panicked desperation must have shone right through them, because Felix immediately flashes him an encouraging smile.

“Cool it a bit, mate,” he tells Hyunjin as he carefully sets the dirty plates down on the sink. “It happens to the best of us. Woojin-hyung isn’t going to fire you for a single broken plate. Besides, if Minho-hyung’s vouched for you, then that means you have a renewable lease on your life here, because Minho-hyung’s word is more than good enough for Woojin-hyung.”

And then, as if Minho had gotten a sense that he was being spoken of, he suddenly peers into the kitchen. The first thing he spots is the broken bits of plate on the floor, which causes his laughter to ring across the small room.

“One down for Hyunjinnie!” He announces playfully. “But now that you got that out of your system, as you can see the world didn’t end - so stop being so nervous! You’re not supposed to overthink washing dishes, after all, okay?”

Felix’s eyes flit from Hyunjin to Minho, and then back again, and soon he’s laughing along even though he looks just as confused as Hyunjin is at Minho’s words.

  
  
  


“How did you get this job anyway, hyung?” Hyunjin asks Minho much later, when it’s way past midnight, and the two of them are on the bus on their way back home - or, well, Minho’s apartment. “Did you always want to be a bartender, or—?”

“Me and Woojin-hyung go way back,” he explains; and then he pauses, chuckling as if he’s recalling some fond memory. “Like swings and slides and sandboxes kind of way back.” He looks at Hyunjin who has his entire attention focused on Minho, and his words. “Actually, it’s kind of a long story, you sure you want to hear all of it?”

It occurs to Hyunjin, right in that moment, that although Minho has heard him bitch and moan throughout numerous heartbreaks and heartaches throughout the years they have been acquainted, he still barely knows anything that can be deemed as _personal_ about the older male. This, even despite the fact that Hyunjin has been living with him for almost a month now, so he nods immediately, quite eager to learn more about Minho at this point.

And so Minho talks.

He tells Hyunjin about how Woojin started his little bar from the money that became available to him once he became of age - it wasn’t the original plan because Woojin first wanted to invest his money into a franchise of of one of his favorite chicken restaurants, but for some reason this is what he'd ended up with. (“Maybe I’d be a delivery boy by now if that had pushed through,” Minho muses out loud. “I don’t know how he ended up with a bar instead but I guess I’m not really complaining.”)

He tells Hyunjin about how he was originally going to be a professional dancer - how he didn’t even bother taking the CSATs because his mind had been made up. And then two years into his career, with barely anything to show for it, he’d fractured one of his leg bones. (“That was easily, bar none, the hardest time of my life,” Minho admits. “And it’s not like it was a career ending injury, but it was really more that I suddenly had too much time in my hands, and all that time was spent thinking over my life choices.”)

And finally, he tells Hyunjin the answer to the original question that was asked.

“Woojin-hyung - he’s the type of friend who helps pick you back up when your entire life is in complete shambles,” he says, and there’s obvious fondness and admiration evident in his tone. “He’s reliable like that, and even though I knew absolute shit about mixology, which meant I could easily tank his newly opened business, he hired me anyway. And now - well, Eugene’s isn’t exactly a big, booming business, but its stable enough, and we have enough regulars coming in to help make ends meet, and — well, hyung’s kind of amazing at making things work efficiently even with just a handful of staff under his purview.”

Hyunjin stares at him, slowly taking in everything that he’s been told. He has a lot of things that he’s curious about, a lot of questions that he wants to ask, but somehow the first one that comes out is,

“Do you think you’d want to to try going back to dancing again?”

Maybe it’s because he suddenly can’t take the image of Minho seamlessly moving along to powerful beats and beautiful melodies, and maybe he just has a very vivid imagination but it’s kind of mesmerizing in his own head.

“Nah,” Minho shrugs, and just like that Hyunjin’s fantasy comes crashing down. He feels his cheeks warming up, and he’s thankful that the dim lighting inside the bus is likely making his blush unnoticeable. “I mean, I guess I miss it sometimes - when that happens I just go to a dance club on my nights off. I kind of like the job I have now - mixing drinks is fun. There’s a science to it, but it’s not the boring type of shit you learn in school,” he chuckles, and turns to Hyunjin, a teasing twinkle in his eye. “Besides, it’s a bit fun helping hapless losers like you get out of your own heads sometimes.”

“Hyung!” Hyunjin balks at being called hapless _and_ a loser, but Minho just laughs and gives his arm a playful punch.

“Woojin-hyung says I’m good at it - acting close to people even when they’re complete strangers, which I guess is part of what makes me good at my job. People feel like they can talk to me about anything.”

Once again, Hyunjin feels himself deflate, because _of course_ he’s not unique. Minho is good at hearing people out - being a bartender he can almost be called a professional listener, even - so it makes sense that he’s heard and counselled more than a few other members of the lonely hearts club.

“But don’t worry Hyunjinnie,” Minho says, and there it is again, that playful, teasing tone. He pats Hyunjin’s thigh and gives his knee a squeeze. “I don’t let just anyone into my own home.”

  
  
  


It’s not until after a week of working at Eugene’s that Hyunjin finally admits to Minho that he’s been completely blowing off his studies.

“Well, that isn’t exactly a secret, Hyunjinnie,” Minho says, but even though the sigh that he releases sounds mighty disappointed to Hyunjin’s ears. “I mean you’re just home all day, and then at work all night - I wanted to think you were at least doing online coursework, but no to that too, huh?”

Hyunjin quietly shakes his head; he’s annoyed at himself for disappointing Minho, somehow.

“Well,” Minho flashes him a small, hopeful smile and reaches over to ruffle his hair - and Hyunjin thinks it’s nice whenever the older male does that, really, that he always ends up unconsciously leaning in to his touch. “Maybe if you ace your exams, you’ll make it through the term anyway?”

Hyunjin curls up into himself - Minho is being way more positive than he is, but then again Minho doesn’t know what he does. “I… already blew off my exams, hyung,” he explains softly. “It was around exam season when I started staying here with you.”

Minho stares at him, looking taken aback, and for the first time since Hyunjin has known him, a little unsure. “Fuck, Hyunjin,” he almost sounds choked up, “If I knew, I’d have _made_ you go.”

“It’s okay, hyung, really!” Hyunjin is frantic because he doesn’t want Minho feeling guilty over this of all things, not when Minho is the only person he’s been able to depend on over the last month. “You’re not my keeper—” He frowns, and pauses because he can feel his eyes welling up with tears. He hates that he cries so easily, because now is certainly _not_ the time to break down senselessly. “I was so far up my own ass and my own personal issues,” he mumbles, sniffing as he continues his futile attempt at holding back his tears.

“Oi, Hyunjinnie—” Minho laughs, because just like that his perpetually amused expression has made a return. He reaches over and wipes a stray tear off Hyunjin’s cheek with his knuckle. “Why are you crying?!”

“I— I don’t know,” Hyunjin admits with a soft chuckle. The truth is, he thinks he’s crying because Minho is being so damn good to him, and he isn’t sure he deserves it. “But hyung— you know, when you said I shouldn’t throw away everything else I have going on in my life?” Minho nods quietly, and Hyunjin continues, “You were right, so I’m going to file a proper leave of absence at university so I won’t have too much trouble re-enrolling next term. Hopefully by then, I’ll have most of my focus back.”

“You can do that?” Minho asks with a curious look, which Hyunjin returns with a shrug.

“I’ll look into what I need to do on my next day off,” Hyunjin promises, hand over his heart.

“Okay, good,” Minho grins and gives his back a highly encouraging pat. “Do what you can - and just so you know, you can stay here with me for as long as you need, but—” This time, it’s Hyunjin’s turn to give him a curious  look, quietly urging him to continue. “But I think at some point you also need to, I don’t know— well, you know,” Minho laughs at the way he trips all over his own words, “—deal with.. Wait, what’s his name again? Seungmin. At one point you’re going to have to deal with him, too, Hyunjinnie.”

  
  
  


_The Ballad of Hwang Hyunjin and Kim Seungmin._

In his head, that's what Hyunjin has taken to calling the story - nay, the doomed romance between him and Seungmin. He knows the way he keeps thinking about it is probably a bit dramatic compared to how things actually played out in real life.

All in all, the story of their love was fairly simple.

Boy Meets Boy. Boy becomes best friends with Boy. Boy falls in love with another Boy. And another, and another, until idiot Boy wakes up one day and realises he’s been stupid all along because he’s always been in love with the original Other Boy.

And in the movies, once you fall in love with, and get together with your best friend, that’s it.

Happy Ending. Cue: Ending Credits.

But in real life, as Hyunjin learned, it’s never as easy as that.

You’re happy for a few months, and then what? The honeymoon phase ends and then maybe your best friend realises that things aren’t what _he_ expected, that he wants more, and not from you, but from life in general.

Maybe your best friend, the one person you’ve always been able to count on through all the ups and downs in your life - maybe they decide to break your heart.

Hyunjin is tired - there’s only so many times his heart can fracture and be patched together again.

  
  
  


Surprisingly (mostly to himself, rather than anyone else), Hyunjin fits in at work quite well. Woojin is a good, benevolent boss, and Minho is Minho. Felix, despite having an accent that’s a little hard to decipher sometimes, is most likely the sweetest boy that Hyunjin has ever met. Finally, apart from them, there’s little Chaeyoung, who is almost quite literally _pocket-sized,_ but has bags full of attitude to go with her small stature. They’re a mixed bunch, and maybe that’s why, as different as Hyunjin feels from them, he also feels like he belongs with them.

“Hyung,” he approaches Woojin one evening, shy and uncertain because it’s the first time he’s going to talk to the older male, just the two of them. “Next term, after I enroll again, and I resume my classes - will it be possible to still keep my job here? Even on a part time basis?”

Woojin gives him a weird look which makes Hyunjin think that he must have overstepped some invisible line because _of course_ he was asking for too much. He shouldn’t think it's okay to keep a job that he can’t commit to.

“Of course you can,” Woojin answers, which has Hyunjin looking up in surprise, accidentally meeting his boss’s gaze in the process. “I’m surprised you even have to ask,” Woojin comments with a chuckle. “I assumed you would have, anyway?”

Hyunjin smiles wide, even though he can’t bring himself to relax - he can’t believe it was as simple as that

“But—” Woojin continues, and Hyunjin nods, listening intently. “You can’t let your school work go to waste, so we’ll need to work something out when it’s exam week or similar. Minho will have my head otherwise - he’s strangely invested in your wellbeing.”

“Huh.” Hyunjin nods slowly, thinking Woojin is being quite fair - _too_ fair, even, but he’s going to try not to overthink it, and just accept the generosity without question. “Minho-hyung is really caring like that, huh?”

Woojin doesn’t even try to hold his laughter back - he cracks up, cackling loud and freely in Hyunjin’s face. “Yeah, sure, of course Minho’s a good guy,” he says, wheezing even as he tries to get his words out. “But he’s not _that_ much of a good guy. Trust me, he usually isn’t _this_ invested in people - so take that however way you will.”

  
  
  


“His name was - _is,_ because it’s not like he’s dead,” Minho clarifies himself with a soft chuckle, “Han Jisung.”

This is how he starts a conversation between him and Hyunjin, one Saturday afternoon as he tries to teach Hyunjin how to prepare a proper margarita.

“Hyung?” He stops in the middle of pouring tequila into a cocktail shaker, surprised as he looks up at Minho. For his part, the latter just chuckles and gestures for Hyunjin to continue.

“We’re reversing our roles this time,” Minho tells him. “So you make the drink, and I’ll tell you my sob story.”

Hyunjin looks awkward and uncertain, but he nods and tries to continue making the cocktail just as he remembers from Minho’s instructions earlier.

“Jisung was one of Woojin’s first employees,” Minho continues, even as he continues to sharply observe Hyunjin. “He was your age, and he was fucking loud.” His eyes sparkle when he laughs, and Hyunjin feels conflicted about this because it’s obvious that Minho is recalling a very fond memory. “He told the funniest stories in the most obnoxious way - and a lot of times he’d go overboard to the point that he can’t read the room, and it gets awkward but… he always made me laugh.”

“His job here was the same as yours, he cleaned up after people, and he did the dishes -  he broke at least five plates on his first day and all that came out of his paycheck,” Minho recalls, snorting out laughter. That alone, is enough to make Hyunjin chuckle as well - it’s always been easy to make _him_ laugh.

“He was clever though - actually, more than that, he was really smart? _Book smart._ He read a lot - and he wrote a lot, and even though he was taking a year off university when we first met, he always  planned on going back.”

“We were never really anything official - but I liked him a lot.” He pauses and he looks down, a few locks of his hair loosening and brushing against his eyes. Hyunjin can’t help but be mesmerized as he stares - he’s known Minho for so long, but it’s only now that he’s realising how long and thick and _beautiful_ the older man’s eyelashes are. He tries to snap out of it, focusing instead on Minho’s words as he jiggles the cocktail shaker in his hold so that he can thoroughly mix its contents.

“He used to talk about how well we fit together - how alike we were in so many ways, and how happy he was about these things because it made him feel happy to always be with me. I used to tease him about it, because he was over the top and ridiculous half of the time, but the truth is, it made me happy every time he said things like that.”

“I don’t know when I fell in love with him, but I did.”

Hyunjin almost shakes the mixer a bit too hard that the lid almost pops off, causing Minho to laugh out loud.

“You okay there, Hyunjinnie?” He asks, leaning forward and over the counter to check on Hyunjin’s state.

“I- I’’m fine, hyung,” he asserts, sighing as he properly opens the cocktail shaker so he can pour some of the contents into a salt-lined martini glass. “Here you go,” he says, his hand a bit shaky even as he slides the drink over towards Minho. “Please continue.”

“Hmm,” Minho nods and sniffs at the drink, but he doesn’t take a sip of it just yet. “A few months ago, he got into this scholarship program abroad, in Japan. I was proud of him, and I knew he really wanted to go - but he told me he wasn’t sure if he should, and I knew it was in part because of me?” He laughs, and sometimes Hyunjin wonders how Minho can laugh at the strangest things - like in the face of obviously painful memories. “That sounds a little self-absorbed, but it’s the truth.”

“So I told him— I told him to go, because there was nothing for him here.” He gently taps his finger against the edge of the glass, wiping away some of the salt to taste, his finger traveling up to his mouth so his tongue can quickly dart out and lick at it. Hyunjin watches each action, seemingly in slow motion - he’s _fascinated_ and once again he has to shake himself out of it so he can focus on what Minho is _saying_ instead of doing.

“I told him I saw him as nothing more than a little brother, and that he should stop expecting anything more from me,” at this point, Minho’s breath hitches, and something sad, almost wistful,has settled in his expression. “In the end I drove him to the airport, and wished him well, and told him to study hard and take care of himself.”

“So—” Minho looks up, and meets Hyunjin’s gaze, his own stare full of all sorts of intense expression. “—I might not know how complicated _you_ have it - everyone experiences things differently, after all - but I think I might know a thing or two about broken hearts.”  

Minho’s lips curl up into a small smile, and he looks both so sad and _so pretty_ at the same time that Hyunjin feels off and strange. He suddenly has this overwhelming urge to do _something,_ and it takes him a minute to realise what that something is.

As soon as he does, he’s quick to act on the urge - he’s leaning over the counter, and reaching over to grab Minho by the collar so he can pull him in closer. His lips easily find their way to Minho’s, parting them against his own as he silently but aggressively asks for more.

In the back of his head, it occurs to Hyunjin that this urge, this _desire_ to kiss Minho is something that has slowly been building up over the weeks, except it’s something that he’s been able to repress and push back, together with everything else that’s gone wrong in his life.

 _Fuck,_ he thinks, because he’s kissing Minho and he really, probably, _totally_ shouldn’t be doing this except—

 _Minho is actually kissing him back_. And he’s doing it with as much fervor and need, and Hyunjin is suddenly so angry that there’s an entire bar countertop separating their bodies.

He wants to say something, and he probably would have, but then they both hear the loud thud of the back door in the kitchen closing, and they quickly spring apart.

“Hey—” And suddenly Chaeyoung is there, walking out from the kitchen, and giving them weird looks. “Didn’t know the two of you were coming in early today?”

Minho shrugs. “I was teaching Hyunjin how to make a few cocktails,” he explains, and he sounds breathy, like he needs to catch some air, _and it’s kind of fucking sexy._

 _Shit,_ Hyunjin thinks. _Shit, shit, shit_.

_Fuck._

  
  
  


Despite how worked up - how _nervous_ \- Hyunjin gets about the kiss, nothing seems to really change after it. Except, while Minho doesn’t exactly act that different around Hyunjin, subtle changes are more than enough to slowly drive him to the edge.

 

Scene One: One time, the two of them pass by an animal shelter together on the way to work, and they end up cooing at the animals. “Dogs are the best,” Hyunjin makes an off-handed comment, a wide smile on his face because that's just the kind of effect dogs have on him.

“Excuse me?” Minho lifts an eyebrow at him; he's put on a slighted tone, like Hyunjin's just uttered something incredIbly slanderous. “Dogs have nothing on cats.”

“Aw, hyung,” Hyunjin laughs, relieved because for a second there he really thought he’d said something seriously offensive. “I had a pet dog growing up - she was the cutest, most loyal thing, and— you would have loved her, probably.”

“No way,” Minho clicks his tongue. “Cats are cuter, smarter—” He laughs, and that’s how Hyunjin knows that Minho is just playing with him. “If we ever get pets, we’re getting cats.”

 _We,_ he lets it slip so casually that Hyunjin could have easily missed it. But he doesn’t, and he feels the tips of his ears go red at the thought. _We,_ he repeats in his head. Like somehow they’d turned into a collective pronoun when Hyunjin wasn’t paying attention.

 

Scene Two: Hyunjin is in the middle of washing dishes - and he’s become so good at this. “Like a professional,” he even proudly declares to Minho once, right after which he went on to ramble on about the sorts of _techniques_ one can employ to make sure that any and all traces of grease is removed.

And so, he’s in the middle of washing dishes at home, doing it carefully and thoroughly and _so focused_ that he doesn’t even notice Minho come up from behind him.

“Boo,” Minho whispers, so sudden and out of the blue that Hyunjin has to let out a squeak in surprise. “Move over,” he instructs with a laugh, stepping forward to stand beside Hyunjin, and then bumping hips against him so he can have room to reach over and wash his own hands under the tap. His fingers lightly graze against Hyunjin’s and Hyunjin almost _drops_ the plate he’d been rinsing.

“Hyung—” He starts, his breath hitching; and then Minho suddenly splashes water at him and he’s laughing, and they’re _both_ laughing because Hyunjin is quickly retaliating.

Hyunjin isn’t sure if this is flirting, but he also thinks this definitely is not _not_ flirting.

 

Scene Three: Hyunjin is sitting on the couch, legs stretched out across the length of it, absentmindedly switching channels on the television as he looked for something entertaining enough to pass time. It’s the middle of the day, and they both have more than several hours left before they needed to get ready for work, and without a word, Minho just joins him, parking himself on the other end of the sofa, while entangling his legs with Hyunjin’s longer ones.

“What should we order?” Minho ponders out loud, phone in hand as he goes through his food delivery app. “I’m too lazy to cook,” he adds, and even as Hyunjin tries to shift and move so that he can disentangle his limbs from Minho’s.

Minho looks like he’s focused on deciding what to get for lunch, eyes glued to his phone and all - but the right corner of his mouth is curled up, forming a barely visible smirk.

“Hyung!” Hyunjin half laughs, half whines, and he tries to gather his legs to himself, but then Minho is laughing, and putting his phone away as he makes a more conscious choice to trap Hyunjin’s legs under his own.

It’s the sudden _domesticity_ that gets to Hyunjin. Moment after moment, scene after scene, every single day - sometimes he feels Minho looking at him like he wants to kiss Hyunjin again, but it never happens. Instead, he starts initiating casual skinship a whole lot more. Little things like hair ruffling and hand grazing - it’s almost as if he’s deliberately, and slowly trying to drive Hyunjin crazy. That, or he must have gone into hypersensitive mode around Minho, because everything the older does suddenly seems magnified to him.

 _“Fuck,”_ is the only constant thought he has because he’s pretty sure that he’s well and thoroughly fucked. Not even in the literal sense, which would probably be better at this point, all things considered. Instead, he’s spiraling down a Minho-shaped rabbit hole and it’s the worst thing happening during the worst timing ever because he doesn't think he's even managed to fully recover from his Seungmin mess just yet.

Minho isn’t even his type, despite how beautiful the man is - or at least, that’s what Hyunjin thinks at first. The harder he falls, the more it gets confusing, because what _is_ his type? The only thing the big heartbreaks of his life really have in common is just that exactly - each of them left with a piece of Hyunjin’s heart that he’ll probably never get back again, and the last thing he wants is to allow Minho the same privilege.

  
  
  


When Minho suddenly begs off work one night, Hyunjin doesn’t think much of it. “I have some old friends to meet,” Minho explains, even though Hyunjin doesn’t really ask why.

When he gets to work, Chan, the guy who takes over bartending duties on Minho’s nights off, is already there.

“Hey, hyung,” Hyunjin greets him with a smile, right after he grabs his apron and puts it on. “Minho-hyung got you to come in last minute, huh?”

“It’s cool,” Chan shrugs. “He’s got his shit to deal with.”

Chan sounds like he’s privy to some information that Hyunjin isn’t, but he doesn’t exactly realise this until it’s two hours into his shift, and he hears a soft cheering coming from outside the kitchen, just by the doorway.

He quickly wipes his hands and his arms on his apron, and then he goes outside to investigate, and that’s when he sees Felix, arms wrapped excitedly around smaller man with dirty blonde hair, and boyish features. He looks confused, but then Woojin spots him and beckons for him to come over.

“Hyunjin, hey, we’ve got a guest tonight,” he explains with a big grin; and then he gestures at the newcomer. “This one here is our Jisung - he used to be in charge of breaking dishes before you came along.”

Hyunjin feels flushed, and he’s about to point out that he’s hardly broken any after his first week, but the other male beats him to a reaction.

“Hyung! That’s no fair!” He whines, loud as fuck and almost obnoxious, if he wasn’t so naturally cute. It’s here that Hyunjin realises that he knows exactly who it is - he isn’t just Jisung, but rather he’s _Minho’s Han Jisung._

Jisung turns to look at Hyunjin as if he’s heard the latter’s thoughts, but then he breaks out into a smile - it almost reminds Hyunjin of the way Minho does it whenever he catches Hyunjin looking at him, and he wonders if this is what Minho had meant by him and Jisung being a lot alike.

“Hey, so, where’s Minho-hyung?” Jisung asks, and initially Hyunjin assumes that he’s the one being asked. But then Woojin shrugs, and he realises that’s who the question was actually directed to. “No fair,” Jisung says, his cheeks looking extra puffy when he makes a pouty expression. “I told him I was dropping by to visit tonight! I’m only in the city until tomorrow, too—” He sighs. “I told him in advance to make sure he would be here!”

And this is how Hyunjin puts the pieces together, and he realises that _this_ is why Minho had asked for a shift change at the last minute.

  
  
  


When he gets home, he notices that the light in Minho’s room is still switched on, so he immediately heads over and knocks on the door.

“Hyung?” He calls out, his voice soft just in case the older already fell asleep anyway. “You awake?”

He hears quiet shuffling inside, and then the door suddenly swings open.

“Hyunjinnie, hey,” Minho greets him. His hair is a mess, and his lips are pressed together in a thin line. He looks tired, and not particularly enthused to see Hyunjin even though he’d opened the door for him. “How was work?” He asks, but it doesn’t sound like a question that he genuinely wants the answer to.

“Uh, I met Jisung tonight,” he begins; on the way home, he had an entire speech planned out on his head, about how Jisung is nice, and cute - and exactly how he’d imagined him to be based on the things Minho told him. _He’s very friendly,_ he was going to say. _And I like him a lot._

“Oh,” Minho answers, his tone so droll and uninterested, that Hyunjin hesitates to go on. “What about it?”

“No… thing, I guess,” Hyunjin exhales shakily. And then the two of them are just standing by the doorway of Minho’s room, looking at each other but not really saying anything.

“That’s it then?” Minho clarifies, after several seconds pass, and Hyunjin responds with a meek nod.

He fully expects that to be the end of it, except, instead of a door to his face, he’s met with Minho’s mouth on his, with Minho’s arm sliding around his waist, pulling him in until their bodies are pressed against each other’s. Hyunjin is surprised, to say the least, and it takes him a couple of seconds before he recovers and is able to return the kiss.

This one is even needier and hungrier than the last one they shared, and Hyunjin himself is clutching at Minho’s shirt, frustrated enough to want it out of the way. But when Minho starts to pull him into his room, and he steps over the threshold, it all becomes too much at once and Hyunjin finds himself forcibly pulling away from the kiss.

“Hyung—” He begins, a little out of breath still, and unsure how to proceed because he’s a little distracted by how swollen Minho’s lips suddenly, and he thinks, _I did that, that’s because of me._

He’s silent a second too long though, because then Minho is shaking his head, a more solemn expression masking his features as he takes a step back, and finally closes the door in Hyunjin’s face.

  
  
  


Sometimes, life feels very slow moving - and then a change in air occurs, and suddenly everything is happening all at once. It feels a little bit like that when Hyunjin goes to work one evening and he finds Seungmin seated by himself, in a small table by the corner.

 _Funny,_ he thinks. First Minho’s ex- _something_ shows up, and then a couple of days later, it’s his that comes barging back into his life.

“What are you doing here?” He asks, fidgeting with his apron pocket; he feels tired and sweaty, and it’s a little strange having Seungmin see him like this. “I’m in the middle of my shift so I can’t exactly stay and chat for long. Dishes and glasses aren’t going to wash themselves.”

He notices that Seungmin has ordered a glass of beer, and some potato wedges to go with it. Hyunjin knows him to usually be a wine and cocktails kind of guy, but for now he’s glad that Seungmin hasn’t chosen to sit by the bar so he can keep fancy drinks coming.

“Oh, what time is your break then?” He asks. Seungmin doesn’t  look too happy to here, and Hyunjin almost feels bad because he knows this isn’t the kind of place his ex-bestfriend-slash-boyfriend would ever choose to frequent. He’s been on the end of more than a few scoldings from Seungmin before, when he was the one who’d pick Hyunjin up after he’s had one too many drinks and he couldn’t be counted on to take himself home safely.

“I could take it now, I suppose,” Hyunjin caves in with a sigh, because he never could resist Seungmin anything. Maybe that’s why he’s been so insistent on running away from getting their issues settled.

He exchanges a quick glance with Felix from across the room, gesturing that he’s going to take a quick break, before he finally slides into the seat across Seungmin. He feels something turning in his stomach, and he supposes it’s not abnormal that he feels sick about how estranged he is from his _best friend_ more than anything else.

“Daehwi told me he saw you were working here now, and I couldn’t believe it,” Seungmin tells him.

 _Right, Daehwi._ Hyunjin has almost forgotten that their old friend from high school had come in almost a week ago with some of his university friends - hard not to, with everything else that Hyunjin has had to deal with since then.

“Your mom called me,” Seungmin continues, and Hyunjin did not expect _that._ “What have you been telling your parents about how you’re doing?”

Hyunjin looks down. “Nothing,” he answers, and that’s the absolute truth. He hasn’t told them that he’s all but moved out of the apartment that they’re still paying, and more than that, he hasn’t told them that he’s stopped attending school, at least for the semester. He’s really in trouble, he knows, but he’s going to fix it on his own time.

Seungmin sighs, and shakes his head disapprovingly. “They’re worried, Hyunjinnie,” he tells him gently, and for a brief moment, Hyunjin hears his best friend, and not the guy who broke his heart. “I’m worried.”

“I’ll talk to them soon,” he assures Seungmin, and when he says it, he knows that it’s true and he means it. “I just needed to take some time for myself.”

“I’m sorry for everything, Hyunjinnie,” Seungmin tells him, and he sounds so sad and regretful that Hyunjin _almost_ feels guilty. He feels like shit, but that doesn’t mean he wants his best friend feeling even shittier.

“I know, Seungminnie.”

“I still love you, you know?” Seungmin almost sounds choked up, which is probably comparable to how Hyunjin _feels_ choked up. “It’s just— I guess it’s a different kind of love. And maybe it always was a different kind of love, and I just confused myself for a while. I’m really, really sorry, Hyunjin. If I can do things over—”

“It’s okay, Seungmin,” Hyunjin cuts him off, not really wanting to hear any more of the apology. “I mean, it’s not, really. It still hurts, but it will be okay. I’ll be alright, and so will you, so don’t beat yourself up for it anymore, because that only hurts both of us more.”

And then he offers Seungmin a small smile - and it isn’t one that makes everything okay, but it’s still a smile, and he hopes his once best friend can understand that it means Hyunjin really means it when he says that one day they’ll be able to work things out as friends again.

  
  
  


“So.”

_“So.”_

“We should talk before you go, huh?”

Hyunjin’s bags are packed because he’s decided that it’s finally time for him to stop imposing on Minho’s kindness. He’s let the lease on his old apartment expire, and for now he’s going back to home live with his parents. He doesn’t exactly have a lot, just the two duffels packed with a random assortment of clothes that he’d brought with him that night, when he and Minho had dropped by his old apartment to gather some of this things. He can’t believe actual _months_ have passed since then.

They stare at each other in silence, at least until Minho looks away to sneak a glance at Hyunjin’s luggage.

“Look, hyung—” Hyunjin starts, but he has no idea how to really begin. He has a lot of thoughts, and a lot of feelings, but they’re all jumbled and mixed together, and he’s never been very good at expressing himself with words.

“I feel like I really fucked up,” Minho interjects, his voice heavy with sadness - maybe even regret? Hyunjin isn’t sure what exactly, but there’s something in the older’s tone that makes his own heart feel heavy.

“No, hyung, I kind of did,” he murmurs. “I don’t know how it happened, but somewhere along the line I started to really, really like you.” _Somewhere along the way, I started to fall for you,_ he thinks, but that feels even heavier, and harder to say.

“Then we both really fucked up,” Minho comments, this time with a bittersweet chuckle. “Because I’m pretty sure you’re not alone in feeling that way.”

And then they stare at each other again, the air heavy with tense silence. Hyunjin’s gaze flickers, and shifts to settle on Minho’s lips, and for a split second he’s almost overcome with that familiar urge to lean in and claim them with his - except this time, he manages to hold himself back.

“I don’t—” His breath hitches, and he has to pause to collect himself properly. “I don’t think either of us are ready for anything right now.”

“I know.”

“And— I’m in a place where I’m really scared of even just _liking_ someone again,” Hyunjin continues. “Because it’s really tiring, falling for the wrong person over and over and _over_ again, and I think I like you too much to add you to that list, hyung.”

“What, you think you’re the only one?” Minho rubs his nose, and looks away. “You don’t have a monopoly on broken hearts, Hyunjinnie.”

“So you agree?” Suddenly, Hyunjin isn’t sure what it is that he wants to hear from Minho. “That we’re probably going to end up breaking each other even more?”

“No, because I’m thinking - what if we don’t end up doing that?” And then Minho is looking directly at him with a gaze so intense that Hyunjin feels himself physically taking a step back. "What if we end up making each other happy?"

“What if we’re both not over the last people we loved?”

“Hyunjinnie—” Minho chuckles and shakes his head; he seems exasperated at this point, but he’s still speaking softly, gently, and with so much care. “Do you ever really forget the people you’ve loved? Because I’m pretty sure, I will always have a small piece of all those people in my life, with me. It doesn’t mean I don’t have enough room for you.”

“Hyung, with my track record— with _our_ track records, it’s looking pretty bleak. Like we’re doomed from the start.” Hyunjin doesn’t know why he keeps arguing - maybe it’s because he _wants_ Minho to convince him.

“Maybe we are,” Minho actually agrees. “Maybe this time next year, you’ll be drinking your sorrows away at another bar, with another bartender serving you cheap soju shots, but that’s all it is. A maybe. Sometimes love just _fades_ , and we don’t know how, when, where or _why_ , but I vaguely recall being taught in high school Biology that the heart is the strongest muscle - so you know what? You’ll be okay, and I’ll be okay, but this thing with us - we’re not going to know how it turns out unless we actually try.”

  
  
  


(“Oppa,” Chaeyoung whines, stomping her feet loudly as she follows Woojin into the kitchen. “Can you give Minho-oppa and Hyunjin reprimands?! This is the third time this week that I’ve walked into them making out - I’m gonna end up needing to bleach my eyes at some point if this goes on!”

“Minho, this is a place of work, learn to keep your hands to yourself,” Woojin deadpans, but he doesn’t really sound scolding, but rather quite distracted as he taste tests the sauce that he’s cooking.

“Maybe Chaeyoungie just needs to quit with the voyeurism if she’s so bothered,” Minho shoots back, smiling sweetly, or rather, _teasingly_ at the glaring, pint-sized waitress.

“Or maybe stay home if you can’t take your hands off of each other that much!” Chaeyoung snaps.

Felix looks completely confused, while Woojin looks quite done and exasperated. Minho shrugs, uncaring, but Hyunjin’s face has already turned a deep shade of read.

“Sorry Chaeng-noona,” He mumbles, head lowered in shame.

“Don’t worry, Hyunjinnie,” Chaeyoung sighs, when she turns and sees the sheepish expression on Hyunjin's face. “It’s not you, it’s your boyfriend who needs to learn that This Is A Place of Work!”

“Hey, I’m pretty sure Hyunjin is as guilty of kissing me as I am of kissing him and—” Minho keeps trying to argue, and Hyunjin keeps laughing loudly, hoping that it helps drown out his embarrassment.)

  
  
  


_fin._

**Author's Note:**

> [ 5 ] THANK YOU FOR READING ALL THE WAY TO THE END. Sob. This was a bit hard to write lmao, because I felt like I put Hyunjin (and Minho too) through some emotional torture, when they’re sweethearts who deserve everything they want in life, and maybe more. I need to cleanse my heart by writing something incredibly fluffy next tbh. ;;
> 
> [ 6 ] Comments and any other kind of feedback, as usual, will be greatly appreciated. ♥


End file.
